Knights to Remember
by Classy-cat18
Summary: The sequel to A Doolittle of Pokemon.  Shonta and Ryan find out that they're not alone, and that their situation is more complicated than they thought.
1. Chapter 1

**Talon's Warning**

_The face of the legendary dog of thunder stared at me, close enough for me to smell his breath. We have crossed paths several times, yet it was a mystery as to why he has taken such an interest in my safety._

_"How do you know about the Aurora Knights? How do you know about _me_?"_

_"My past is your present," he said._

_"Excuse me?"_

_"My past is your present."_

_I looked up. Storm clouds dotted the sky in my mind. I welcomed them with open arms, anticipating the lightning._

_"My soul is your soul. My blood is your blood," he continued._

_I looked down at the Aurora Key. It was covered in blood! I tried to wipe it off, but it wouldn't come clean._

_"What's happening?" I cried out to him. I scrubbed at the golden dragon that was wrapped around the Key. I saw its glowing eyes._

_"You cannot control the dragon. Your desires must be the same as his."_

My eyes shot open. I had that dream ever since the Key had been awakened, and each time I had it, it felt more real. It was starting to turn into a real nightmare.

I was once more in Ryan's bed. Every time I tried to give him back his bed, one of our mothers would interfere and insist that "I make myself at home". But this wasn't my home. Now both Mom and Ryan slept on the floor of the den. It would be weeks until my house was restored.

I looked outside the window at the cloudy night sky. There was something wrong with what I saw. I found the problem: it was snowing. Gentle snowflakes were falling slowly on the ground. It showed no signs of sticking, though.

I was about to wake up the Pokemon from their sleep when I heard tapping. A Sneasel was on the other end, tapping on the window with one of her long claws. It stopped tapping and put the claw to its lips, signaling for me to keep quiet.

"What are you doing here?" I mouthed.

The Sneasel lifted something to the glass for me to see: an Aurora Crystal. At least, I think it was. For one thing, it was a milky-white color with black swirls. It looked more like an opal.

"Are you a Knight?" I mouthed. The Sneasel nodded and gave a "come here" gesture. I held up my index finger as if saying "Give me a minute". I put on my sneakers and slipped through the front door. It was waiting in the doorway, wearing a smile.

"Did Char or Feather send you here?" I asked the Sneasel. I noticed that it had stopped snowing.

"Yeah, in a way," it told me in a feminine voice. "Call me Talon. Are you Shonta, the new holder of the Dragon Key?"

"Say what?"

She pointed to the Key. "That _is_ what it's called, right?"

"I don't know. Everyone has just been calling it the Aurora Key."

"News flash, sister: There are _two_ Aurora Keys. You are holding the Light Dragon Key. There is also the Dark Phoenix Key, which is just as powerful."

"It sounds evil."

"It's dangerous, but it's certainly not evil. Think about the two Keys as Yin and Yang. One cannot exist without the other."

Talon had my full attention. "Tell me more, Talon."

She turned her back to me. "Walk with me, little Knight." She started to walk around the house, toward the flower field near the edge of town. I hesitated for a minute then followed her. Char and Feather never told me these things. Why?

I caught up with Talon. "Where are Char and Feather? I haven't seen them in days."

She shrugged. "They may be gathering the new recruits, so they may come back to you soon."

"Do the new recruits go to a school or something?"

"Yes, they are taught by experienced Aurora Knights. Weak recruits with strong Crystals need to be taught how to control them." She sounded as if she didn't want to talk about the subject.

"How was your life like before you joined the Aurora Knights?" I asked her.

Her tone became harsh and cold. "Crappy, like everyone else's. It was like a roller coaster; first life was wonderful, then it was hell, now it's a mixture of the two. Now let me ask you a question."

"Shoot."

"Did Char and Feather tell you this when they first met you?"

"No, but they didn't have time to tell me these things."

She gave a harsh chuckle. "A sorry excuse. They had plenty of time; they just wanted to keep you in the dark. Like those other pathetic excuses for Knights kept _me_ in the dark."

"Why are you talking about the Knights like that?"

She stopped. "Because they are as evil as the Umbra Demons!"

I took a step back. "You're lying. They saved my life!"

"Yes, but they also take it away. They save everyone, and then demand the ultimate price: their life. Doesn't that sound like the legend of the Umbra Demons?"

"You mean they kill?"

Tears streamed down her face. "No, but they do much worse. When they saved my life, they told me that I would be hunted because I was an Aurora Knight. They told me to accept my fate and join them. They told me to leave my home and the friends that I had left! Because of them my whole life went into oblivion!"

"But you made new friends and found a new home, right?"

"Why does everyone expect me to just throw away my past? Why can't I go back to him and die?"

"Who are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about my mate! I had to leave him because he didn't 'make the cut'. He wasn't strong enough for them, but I'm not strong at all without him!"

"Then just go back to him."

"If I do, then he dies. Umbra Demons will hunt down your loved ones until you have nothing left. He is all that I have left and I will not let him die!"

Now I felt tears. "I'm sorry."

"Not as sorry as you're going to be. Pokemon may lose their life, but humans lose more than that."

"What is that?"

"They lose their _humanity_. The moment a human receives their Crystal, they lose a part of their human selves literally. They become Pokemon."

"They turn into Pokemon? _I'm_ going to turn into a Pokemon?"

She nodded again. "It's sad, but true. I've heard stories about humans that were unlucky to find a Crystal. Sometimes it does nothing because they weren't chosen to wear one. They didn't have the soul that the Crystal searches for."

"Soul?"

"Those that are very close to Pokemon have souls that are appealing to them. They are almost like Pokemon themselves. Those are the ones that the Crystals want. But it's not enough. To have the soul of a Pokemon, one must have the body to match it in order to wield the Crystals. A little bit of DNA alteration is all it takes, and that's the first thing that the Crystals do to you. Not enough to completely change you, but enough to give you what you need. After all, humans aren't physically capable of breathing fire or swimming up strong currents, right?"

I nodded, my eyes fixated on Talon.

"But aren't you a lucky devil!" Talon continued. "You have the Dragon Key, and that takes more than a little change for you to wield it." She looked up in the sky and quietly growled. "He finally sensed me. He's slowly getting better."

There was a loud thud behind me. I turned around and looked up at Char. He glared at Talon, fire in his eyes. Talon glared back.

Char pushed me behind his back. "What are you doing here, Talon? I thought I told you not to come near her and fill her head with your ideals."

"The only thing I filled her head with is the truth. Why someone as _virtuous_ as you didn't want to tell her that is a mystery to me."

"I didn't have time."

Without thinking, I punched Char's back as hard as I could. "That's the lamest excuse I've ever heard!" I cried out. I ran back in the house, hating for what I was about to become.

_What is going on? Who are the good guys? Will I have to leave my life completely like Talon?_ These questions raced through my mind as I tiptoed through the rooms and back into the bed. But another question froze my heart in fear. If Talon was right about humans turning semi-Pokemon, and if the Dragon Key has been inside of me…

_Am I already part Pokemon?_


	2. A Trip to Ecruteak

**A Trip to Ecruteak**

_Why can't I be normal? Why can't I…breathe?_ I felt something pinch my nose. Ryan.

"Sleeping the day away again, are we? Why did they choose you to carry the Aurora Key, anyway?" he asked me as he released my nose.

"Don't go there," I grumbled. I looked out of the window at the late morning sun-drenched yard. Actually, it looked earlier than usual.

"Five minutes after eight, and you're sleeping while the rest of us are enjoying the sun," he teased.

"You're waking me up at _8:05_?" I growled.

"Yeah! Char and Feather are taking us to meet some of our fellow Aurora Knights. Aren't you psyched?"

"Sure I am," I said in mock enthusiasm, recalling my conversation with Talon. The rest of the night was turbulent, revisiting the Raikou dream when I finally fell asleep. I didn't even remember my falling asleep; I was too busy hating Char for what he had hidden from me. How can he expect me to leave everything in my life and join something that was starting to sound more and more like the French Foreign Legion?

_What about Feather? Shouldn't I be hating her, too?_

I couldn't hate Feather. She…she…

_I'm being biased. I can't hate Char for something that maybe even he had to endure when he joined the Aurora Knights._

"Hello! Earth to Shonta! Are you there, Shonta?" Ryan yelled in my ear.

I snapped back to reality. "Stop that, will you?" I told him.

"Are you alright? You're moodier than usual. So has Char. Don't tell me you two got into another fight." He sat on the bed, his eyes wearing a slightly concerned expression.

"This Knight named Talon came by and told me how the Aurora Knights made her leave behind everything, even her mate."

"Oh, Char told me about her! You're such a baby, Shonta."

I picked up a pillow and smacked Ryan with it. "I'm not a baby! Why are you picking on me this morning?"

"You're getting overemotional about something inevitable and natural. To Pokemon, at least."

"Excuse me? _Overemotional? Inevitable?_ Since when did you use such big words?"

He smacked me with the same pillow. "What I'm saying is that Pokemon aren't humans. They usually don't have to hang around their parents as long as we have to hang around ours."

"Talon wasn't a child, Ryan."

"But most of the recruits are. Feather explained that Talon was about the same age as the other recruits when she found her Aurora Crystal, but she decided to try to avoid her fate. When fate caught up with her, she was all the more unprepared. It was considered her punishment."

"Now that's cold. We're talking about the Pokemon version of the French Foreign Legion, not homework!"

"What's so bad about the Aurora Knights?"

"We almost got killed before we officially joined! Every mission could be like that, or worse!"

Ryan rolled his eyes. "Why did you even want to be a Pokemon researcher, anyway?"

I opened my mouth to answer, and then closed it. He made a huge point; researchers and watchers go through the same risks. I _was_ being a baby. "You're right. I'm sorry," I chose to say.

Ryan smiled and stood up. "Of course I'm right. Now get some clothes on, already!"

I put on my usual T-shirt and blue jeans ensemble, this time with a baseball cap. I found a backpack with more of my things, among them a new pair of gloves, fingers cut off. I slipped them on, slung the backpack over my shoulder, and looked in the bathroom mirror.

_Ryan sure is looking forward to this, probably because he thought his life was so ordinary until all of this happened,_ I thought to myself. _Even I spent one minute staring into Raikou's face before I even knew about the Aurora Knights._ I took a deep breath and made a dash for the front door, opening it slowly. If this morning was like every other morning, I was to be very careful or…

"You idiotic bug!"

"Pathetic lizard!"

Ripper was picking another fight, this time with Char. I looked at the left side of the porch and saw Reaper meditating, grumbling something to himself. I walked to him and tapped him on the shoulder. "I thought _you_ fought with Ripper at this time," I said to him.

Reaper opened an eye. "Fortunately Char came and granted me peace of mind this morning. Are you prepared for today's trip?"

I nodded, showing him my backpack. "Have you seen Artemis and Static?" He pointed to the two Pokemon that were sitting next to Feather, who was trying to calm down Char.

"Thanks. You should stay here and watch over the house. I trust you, but Ripper's something else."

Ryan walked out of the house, carrying his backpack. "I should return Ripper while he's not looking," he whispered.

"Are you looking for a fight?" Char roared.

"No, I'm starting…" Ripper started, but was cut short as he was drawn in his pokeball.

"I smell a corny line, so just skip it," I said to Ryan as I returned Artemis and Static. We walked up to Feather and Char.

"Let's get this show in the sky!" Char yelled excitedly. He crouched so Ryan could climb on him.

"Before we go, where are we headed?" I asked him as I climbed on Feather's back.

"Ecruteak," Feather answered. With that, we took off.

We were barely out of the Ilex Forest when Ryan said "We should've told our moms where we were going, Shonta!"

"Too late for that! We should be back before they get home, so don't worry," Char said.

"Speeding up!" She swept back her wings like a fighter jet. Everything started to get blurry. I felt myself get heavy from the G-force.

Feather moved her beak as if she was talking, but nothing came out. She slowed down to my relief. "I said we should be there in no time now," she repeated.

"Didn't we leave Char behind?" I asked.

"He'll catch up really soon." She looked down and dropped altitude again. Char flew up from below with a heavily breathing Ryan on his back. "Told ya!"

"I wish you would stop doing that!" I heard Ryan yell to Char. "We almost crashed and you know it!"

"We're here!" Feather chimed. Below us was the center of Ecruteak City. For a second I thought we flew through some sort of time portal; Ecruteak looked like it was stuck in the Feudal Era. It didn't change one bit since I was little. A city frozen in time…

"Hey, Shonta! I see the college! Look over to the left!" Ryan yelled.

"Um, guys? Something's wrong down there. You keep on going while I check it out," Feather said. She flew down and landed in the middle of the city. A few people were standing and staring in different directions, not moving an inch. I walked to a nearby man and waved my hand in front of his face. He didn't even blink.

"Everyone's like this. I wonder what happened," I said to myself.

"It's probably a powerful Disable attack," Feather guessed.

Char landed behind me and looked around while Ryan slid off of him. "I'm guessing that Madame Tussaud came by and replaced everyone with wax dummies," Ryan joked.

"You're the wax dummy," I said.

"At least he's not frozen," a Pokemon's voice said.

"Who said that?" I asked in a demanding voice.

"Look down," the voice said. Looking down I saw a Meowth at my legs, a female by the looks of it. Around her neck was a golden colored Aurora Crystal with a crescent moon encased in it.

"Hi! My name's Twilight. You must be Shonta, the new owner of the Dragon Key. Who's the wax dummy?"

Ryan gave a halfhearted laugh. "I'm Ryan Steele. What's going on here?"

"We're not entirely sure, but we think that an Umbra Demon came by and froze the whole city. Circe had Magic, Wobert, Sentret and me search for clues."

"So Circe's here," Char said.

"Circe's a Psychic Aurora Knight, Shonta. She healed Char when he was nearly killed by Ripper," Ryan informed me. "So where is she, Twilight?"

"Let's see. She could either be at the Ecruteak Gym or at Ecruteak College. Maybe she's just somewhere in the streets. I'm worried about Wobert, though."

"What's wrong with Wobert?"

The second I was done with that sentence, we heard distant screaming. Twilight sighed. "That's what's wrong." She ran to the source of the sound. Ryan and I ran after her, leaving Char and Feather behind.

We found Twilight with a Sentret and a very freaked out Wobbuffet. The Wobbuffet was wearing a purple Aurora Crystal with an eye design encased in it while the Sentret was wearing an Aurora Crystal similar to Twilight's. "Where were you, Twilight? Someone could have attacked me and no one would be around to save me," he said.

"Wobert, what does 'split up' mean?" Twilight calmly asked Wobert.

"I could've gone with you."

"Weren't you with Sentret?"

"She told me to scan this street while she checked out the next street," Wobert explained.

"How do you expect to become a full-fledged Aurora Knight when you get scared of your own shadow?" Sentret yelled at him.

"It wasn't my shadow! Something's in there! Something moving!" He pointed inside a nearby house. An Abra stepped out of there, wearing an Aurora Crystal similar to Wobert's.

"Magic, what are you doing in there?" Twilight asked him.

He yawned. "Sleeping."

"I didn't know you guys slept on the job," I butted in.

"We don't. He does," Sentret said, pointing at Magic.

"This mission totally screwed up my schedule," Magic complained.

"I'm telling Circe that you were too lazy to do your job," Sentret told him as she ran off.

"Gee, she's a ray of sunshine today," he grumbled.

Twilight cleared her throat. "Guys, this is Shonta and Ryan. Shonta and Ryan, this is Wobert and Magic. They're recruits just like you two. They're going to help us look for that Umbra Demon."

"We are?" Ryan asked.

I elbowed him. "Why do you think an Umbra Demon would freeze the whole town?" I asked the Pokemon.

"They know that the owner of the Phoenix Key lives here in Ecruteak; they just don't know where," Twilight answered. "So they're probably searching the whole town for him."

"So where is he?"

"He lives in Ecruteak, but he had to go out of town today."

"I'm thinking that they just froze the town because they wanted to show us they could," Magic said drowsily.

"That makes a little sense," Ryan commented.

"Where did Feather and Char go?" I wondered out loud.

A Pidgeotto landed on a roof near us. "Sorry to desert you, but Char wanted to see Circe. Anyway, I checked out the Ecruteak Gym. Even the gym match was frozen! Some kid with his Cyndaquil was going against the gym leader's Haunter. It looked like the kid was going to lose that round."

"So no one's found anyone that could've done this," I said. Then I heard the sound of chanting. It was the kind of chanting that can be done quietly but can echo over large distances so many people could hear.

"Please tell me that I'm not hearing things," I told the group.

"Depends. What are you hearing?" Ryan asked.

"Some sort of eerie chanting."

Everyone nodded.

"Everyone, be on your guard," Feather said boldly.

The chanting got louder for a while, and then stopped. At that time, a Drowzee calmly walked into view. He also wore a purple Aurora Crystal. In his hand was a bell attached to a string.

"Are you the one that froze everyone in this place?" I asked the Drowzee.

He nodded. "I am Houdini," he announced.

Twilight growled. "You're an Umbra Demon!"

"Please, don't call me such a barbaric name," he said. "I am a Knight like you. I merely did this to send forth a message."

"Looks like you were right, Magic," Wobert said.

"See how I, one Pokemon, could easily freeze an entire city in time? It would probably take five humans to do the same. Humans will never make proper Aurora Knights."

"What makes you say that?" Ryan asked him.

"Humans are such weak creatures. You won't make it far, I assure you. Stay out of our way and continue with your pathetic lives." He rung the bell in his hand and disappeared via Teleport. Suddenly everyone that was frozen was moving along like nothing happened.

"That guy was pumped up with himself," Twilight said. "He didn't freeze time. He just used Disable on everybody. No one seems to notice yet; it was only like this for thirty minutes at the most."

"We should go back to Sunflower Town, guys," Feather told me and Ryan. "Riku won't be back until this evening."

I could almost feel the air around Ryan get hotter. "Oh man! We were here to see _him_!"

"You told me about him, didn't you?" I said.

"Don't get me started!"


End file.
